


Amorphous

by gladdecease



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Supernatural
Genre: Big Bang Challenge, Community: sncross_bigbang, Crossover, Crowley (Supernatural) is Crowley (Good Omens), Gen, Golems, Judaism, Metafictional Elements, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Season/Series 05
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-12
Updated: 2010-05-12
Packaged: 2017-10-09 17:41:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/89924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gladdecease/pseuds/gladdecease
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Something has been following Dean. In their efforts to find out what and how to stop it, the Winchester brothers learn more about the turncoat demon Crowley than they'd ever expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Extensive, spoilery-for-fic author's notes can be found at the end of the fic. Otherwise, I want to thank [angelicfoodcake](http://angelicfoodcake.livejournal.com/profile) for the art - it looks _amazing_! I'd also like to thank the mods at [sncross_bigbang](http://community.livejournal.com/sncross_bigbang/profile) for putting everything together, and for trusting that I would finish on time; somehow, I did!
> 
> Originally posted [here](http://community.livejournal.com/glad_fics/33486.html).

  


  


> David Siegel spent his afternoon reading over the old texts he had hidden away in a back room. It had been so long since he'd studied Kabbalah properly, and he needed to ensure that this worked perfectly.
> 
> Once he was satisfactorily prepared, he sent his associates home and closed down the temple, claiming a private concern that needed resolving. It was only partly a lie.
> 
> When they were gone, and all the doors locked, he began to prepare the ritual. It was simple enough – gather sufficient earth to build a man-sized model, shape it into the form of your choosing, and bless it with the proper prayers. The actual trick of it was your own worthiness – if he had not learned enough, or was not considered able by the Lord, then nothing would happen. But if he _was_, then…
> 
> He built the figure two heads taller than himself, and wider in the shoulder than is found in humans. As he built, he murmured what the untrained ear would hear as nasal, lilting song. His prayers grew louder in tone and more songlike in quality as he continued, until he was speaking clearly enough to be heard from the other side of the temple. With some difficulty, he reached up to form the curve of an ear, the deep set of an eye, the flat bridge of a nose.
> 
> When the form was as complete as he needed it to be, he drew three letters into the head of his creation, saying, "Then the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul."
> 
> He stepped back and waited.
> 
> For a minute, there was only silence. Then, with a harsh gasp, the clay figure opened its mouth, and _breathed_. Then it spoke. In gravelly Hebrew, it asked, "What am I?"
> 
> David stumbled over his own tongue. His knowledge of Hebrew was strictly religious, but he managed to create a coherent statement. "You are a creation of Earth, made by my hand as Adam was made by the LORD God."
> 
> "What is my purpose, O Creator?"
> 
> "You are to… to find a man, and bring him to me."
> 
> "What man is this?"
> 
> He opened his mouth, but had no words. He didn't know _anything_ about the man he was trying to find.
> 
> Then a voice behind him said, "He is a traveler, and a warrior. He is a man important to Heaven."
> 
> David turned around, shocked, to see a balding man in a dark suit. He smiled unpleasantly at David.
> 
> In unaccented English, he said, "Hello, Rabbi Siegel."
> 
> "Do I know you?" he asked cautiously, looking to see if any of the doors had been opened.
> 
> "No. But _I_ know _you_." He stepped closer to David, then turned his head to stare at his creation. "And, more importantly, I know what you're doing."
> 
> David swallowed thickly. "I… I don't–"
> 
> The stranger rolled his eyes. "Oh, don't try to lie to me, you're wasting your time. You're only trying to find Dean Winchester because I told you to."
> 
> He paled. "What?"
> 
> He smiled thinly. "I'm Zachariah. The angel who talked to you in a dream? Showed you what Dean Winchester looks like?" He raised his eyebrows, faking surprise. "None of this ringing a bell?"
> 
> "I–"
> 
> "No, I get it," the angel said, stepping closer to the clay creature. "You didn't want to believe it was true. A lot of people don't. But then you saw him, didn't you?"
> 
> David swallowed and nodded. "Two days ago."
> 
> "And you didn't know how to find me. So, instead, you made this." Zachariah waved a hand over the clay figure. "You know, sometimes you humans do things that are surprisingly intelligent." Covering clay eye sockets, he switched to yet another language, full of harsh syllables and glottal stops.
> 
> An intense white light streamed out between Zachariah's fingers, so bright David had to look away. When the light dissipated and David could look at the angel again, he had pulled his hand away, leaving the clay behind… changed. Hardened.
> 
> "That should do it," Zachariah said, satisfied. He glanced at David, grinning more enthusiastically now. "No offense to your design, but it was a bit too… malleable. This will work much better for our needs." He smacked the creature on the shoulder, saying, "Get to it!"
> 
> Obediently, it turned on its heels and walked towards the nearest exit. The doors flew open with a wave of Zachariah's hand, and with wet, squishy footsteps, it left.
> 
> David stared at the prints it left behind. Those would stain the floor. He looked up to the angel, wordlessly asking.
> 
> Zachariah shrugged helplessly. "Sorry, David; it was either the head or the feet, and the head's the important part." He waved, saying, "We'll be in touch," and then he was gone.
> 
> After a moment spent not thinking about the insanity of his day, David went to get a mop and bucket with shaking hands.
> 
> Meanwhile, across the Atlantic Ocean, another angel (and part-time bookshop owner) had the feeling that something very wrong was about to happen.

Becky stopped there, gaping. "Chuck!" she said breathlessly. "Is this – is this what I _think_ it is?"

On the webcam, Chuck frowned slightly. "Is _what_ what you think it is?"

"This angel," she said, "The bookstore owner across the Atlantic?"

"Oh." Chuck's shoulders slumped. "Yeah, that's probably what you think it is."

"You mean–?"

Chuck sighed, covering his face with a hand. "I'm _never_ going to get this one published," he complained, voice muffled. "I barely got away with including Crowley, but this? This is just too obvious."

Becky tried to stop herself, but she couldn't help it.

She squealed.

Chuck dropped his hand, staring blankly at her.

Becky giggled nervously. "Sorry."

\----  
\----

AMORPHOUS

A Narrative of Certain Events occurring in the last few months of the second  
age of human history, in strict accordance as shall be shewn with:

"Supernatural" by Carver Edlund  
ALSO KNOWN AS:  
**The Winchester Gospel of the Prophet Chuck**

AND

**"Good Omens" by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett**

Compiled and edited by gladdecease  
Illustrated by angelicfoodcake

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

**Supernatural Beings**

Zachariah  
(An Angel on the side of Heaven.  
Also, kind of a dick.)

Aziraphale  
(An Angel on the side of Humanity,  
and part-time rare books dealer.)

Castiel  
(A Rebel Angel on the side of Humanity.  
Lacking a sense of humor.)

Crowley  
(A Demon, whose frequent double-crossing has left the  
question as to which side he is on Unanswered.)

**Humans**

Dean Winchester  
(A Hunter and the Vessel of the Archangel Michael.)

Sam Winchester  
(A Hunter and the Vessel of the Archangel Lucifer.)

Chuck Shurley (A Prophet)

Becky Rosen (A Fangirl)

David Siegel (A Rabbi)

**ADAM** (The Antichrist)

Full Chorus of Bewildered Policemen, Curious Newscasters,  
and other Busybodies poking their noses into Certain Events.

**And:**

A golem

\----  
\----

Several Weeks Later…

\----

As far as Dean was concerned, this was all God's fault. _He_ started all of this mess with that whole "Let there be light" "And there was light" "And it was good" business. The universe could have started itself up on its own, and then God could have left it alone, and then this pattern of over-involvement/no involvement/what do you _mean_, "He left Heaven?" would never have happened. Then the angels (who wouldn't have existed anyway, without God) wouldn't have decided to force the Apocalypse, and Dean's life probably wouldn't suck so much right now.

So yeah. Everything was God's fault. Dean planned on telling Him that, just as soon as Sam got him out of this latest mess. In the meantime, swearing quietly under his breath (or not so quietly at the top of his lungs) was working alright as a substitute for direct confrontation.

"God damn it," Dean said, turning a sharp right down an empty side street. The Impala's tires squealed in protest, and Dean absently rubbed a hand apologetically across her dashboard. He glanced up at the rear view mirror and froze at the sight of a large, humanoid figure walking down the street he'd just turned onto. Swearing under his breath, he sped up and turned onto another street. The car he cut off honked angrily at him, but Dean had other things to worry about. He turned again on the next crossroad he found, hoping that driving in circles would be enough to hold it off.

The next road he turned on to lead into a development, though, so Dean had to back out and find another street. He didn't want this thing getting anywhere near houses. Just being in a town was bad enough, but he couldn't outrun this thing on the open road for long.

After a few more turns Dean was back on track, driving on the small streets between abandoned warehouses and stores with dirty windows and neon signs reading "Not Open", that giant _thing_ a small black smudge in his mirror. If he could keep this up for another few hours, he'd be safe. Sam would figure it out by then. Dean's shoulders slumped as he sighed, forcing himself to relax. If his brother could spend hours figuring out what this thing was, he could spend a few getting the damn thing turned around. He turned left, and all the stiffness he'd just gotten out of his shoulders came back with friends.

It was a dead end.

He backed out quickly, getting back on the street he'd been on before, but the delay meant that what once was a small blob in his rear view mirror had become a recognizable figure again. It was getting way too close for Dean's tastes, but he if he drove into another dead end it would get a lot closer than that. He checked down a tiny street between two large buildings, saw light at the end, and turned.

Half way down that street, a bulky dumpster rested against one of the walls. On any other street, this wouldn't be a problem for Dean, but in this tiny alley he couldn't get the Impala past it. Grumbling under his breath, Dean switched into reverse, starting what looked to be a way more than three-point turn. With a bit of maneuvering, he got the car turned around, just in time to see something that made his breath catch in the back of his throat.

It was there, at the end of the alley, close enough to see the carvings on its forehead. It wasn't moving; it didn't need to. It knew, and he knew, that it had won. It had taken the creature weeks to do it, but it had finally found him.

Slowly picking up the bag he'd left in the seat next to him, Dean turned off his car. Pocketing the keys, he murmured, "Sorry, baby," and threw open his door. Duffel smacking heavily against his back, Dean ran down the alley, gaining as much distance over the creature as he could. It stayed still for a long moment, before taking long, deliberate steps forward. In the thirty seconds it took Dean to get to the end of the alley and turn the corner, it had already inspected and abandoned the Impala, leaving the poor car covered in a thick layer of mud.

"God _damn_ it," Dean panted, running towards the one thing he thought might stop it.

Most of the docks were rotten and abandoned, the river long since given up as a useless mode of travel. Still, there were one or two docks that, for whatever reason, had a small boat tied to the end. Reaching one, it was the work of a minute to untie the rope keeping the boat from floating off. Jumping into the freed boat, Dean was glad that it hadn't taken longer – he could see it walking towards the river now. As the boat drifted into a current, Dean sighed deeply. He was safe, for now.

Then his phone rang.

Dean dug the phone out of his bag and answered with a confused, "Hello?"

"You're not safe, Dean."

"What?" Dean double checked the caller ID. Unknown number. Female voice. Had he given his number to a chick in a bar recently? He couldn't remember. "Who is this?"

"A friend." Dean snorted. "I'm on your side, I swear," she insisted.

The sad thing was, at this point he didn't really have any other option _besides_ believing her. If she was lying – well, he was already screwed as it was, couldn't get much worse. If she wasn't, though… He had to take that chance. So he listened, however reluctantly, as she continued.

"It's going to follow you into the water. You have to get to the other side, and wait for help there."

"The hell I am," Dean said. "If I stop for even a minute, that thing's gonna get me. I'm safer in…" He trailed off. The creature was standing on the dock he'd taken off from, looking down at the rope he'd untangled. Without hesitating for a second, it stepped off the dock and dropped into the river like a stone.

Dean swallowed.

He was suddenly very aware of how muddy the water was. How he wouldn't be able to see anything approaching the boat from underwater. How surprisingly long that thing's reach could be, given the right motivation. Moving to the back of the boat, Dean found a rudder and started steering towards the far shore.

"Dean?"

He cleared his throat. "Okay, you want to help me? Fine. I'll get over to the other side, and your help had better already be there."

"He will be."

Something about her voice was definitely familiar. The breathy tone, the enthusiastic conviction, the high pitch, all of it rang a bell in the back of his head. If he could just figure out where he knew her from…

The boat shuddered to a stop as it hit the shore. Dean stumbled a little, regaining his balance, and then climbed out of the boat. Getting some distance between himself and the river, he said, "Okay, I'm there. Where's your guy?"

"Right behind you, probably," she said, giggling, and that _clinched_ it. His jaw dropped. He _knew_ that giggle, he _knew_ that voice, and now he knew where he knew it from. That creepy fangirl. The fucking _Supernatural_ convention. Of all the people –

"_Becky_?" he asked disbelievingly.

But then there was a hand on his shoulder, squeezing tight, and everything – her giggling over the phone, the clean scent of water and earth, the sight of a giant waterlogged creature climbing out of the river, even the hand on his shoulder – vanished.

The soaking wet thing took long, soggy steps, until it stood where Dean had been until only a moment ago. It waited there, patiently, for a few seconds, as if for some invisible signal. After a moment it tilted its head, filtering the new information, and then walked off in a new direction.

Not coincidentally, several hundred miles from that riverside, in the very direction the creature was now walking, Dean had just appeared in someone's living room.

It wasn't a new thing for him, though the Hello Kitty throw pillow on the couch was different.

\----

Castiel was in London. He had been investigating an unusual presence somewhere in the country, and found himself in the capital city's west end area, staring at a bookstore. It didn't have the same strange feeling he was investigating to it, but all the same there was an odd presence here as well. He considered entering, and wondered if what the Winchesters had once told him about "Breaking and entering" still applied when something supernatural owned the bookstore.

Deciding to err on the side of risk, he attempted to open the door, and found his efforts repelled. Strange. He tried to appear on the other side of the door, but instead appeared in the very different bookstore next door. The owner did not look up from his magazine at Castiel's entrance, though when he walked up to the desk he did raise an eyebrow at the manner of his dress. Deciding not to comment, the man said, "Can I help you?"

"What do you know about the owner of the bookstore next door?"

The man frowned. "What, Mr. Fell? He's an alright guy; a bit froofy, but not bad. He doesn't come in here a lot, of course. Prefers his books to ours. Keeps to himself."

Castiel tilted his head. "Froofy?"

"Yeah, froofy. You know…" The man made a vague hand gesture, giving up when it became clear that Castiel did not, in fact, know. Several other euphemisms led to the same result. Finally, he gave it up completely, saying, "Ah, never mind. It's not important."

Brow still wrinkled with confusion, Castiel asked, "Do you know if… Mr. Fell is in today?"

"Probably not. He's been taking off a lot lately. Ill family, I figure." He shrugged. "Sorry."

Leaving the bookstore, Castiel walked back in front of Mr. Fell's bookstore. Frowning at the locked front door which refused to open, he muttered a string of Enochian words under his breath, and reached out to try the knob again.

His phone rang.

Pausing, Castiel glanced between his pocket and the door. A known curiosity, and an unknown – danger? news? Given the short list of people who had access to the number, it was probably a request for help.

Sighing, he pulled out his phone and answered it. "Yes?"

"Cas, it's me."

"Hello, Sam." Castiel watched passerby, noticing that no one seemed to notice either him or the bookstore. Their eyes seemed to move straight from the pornographic bookstore on the right to the building with blocked windows on the left. That was interesting. "What is it?"

"I don't know," Sam said. "Something's been following us – following Dean, actually – and I've been trying to figure out what it is, but I'm not coming up with anything. I could really use your help."

Castiel looked up, stared at the white and gray cloud cover. He would have to return here later, then. "Where are you?" As Sam rattled off the name of their newest residence, Castiel looked through the display windows of the storefront. If he squinted at just the right angle, he could almost read the title off the spine of a few books. A number of the names were unfamiliar to him, and appeared to be cheaply made novels. Farther back, though, he thought he saw a book with a cover that wasn't laminated paper. Or leather. That was _older_ than leather. He squinted. If he could just –

"Castiel?"

Sam's voice shook the concentration out of Castiel. "What?"

"You okay? You sound a little–"

"I'm fine. I'll be there in a moment." Snapping his phone shut, Castiel focused in on the Motel 6 Sam had specified, and soon was there. Sam was staring at his phone. Dean was… not there. "Where's Dean?" Castiel asked. Sam jumped, just a little, and turned to face Castiel.

"Cas, hey," he said. "Since this thing's been following Dean, we thought he probably shouldn't stay in one place for long. He's driving around town, somewhere." He motioned Castiel over to the desk where he sat. A number of newspaper clippings were spread out on the table, with additional articles open in web browsers on his computer. "I've been looking through these, and trying to find some reference in lore, but nothing seems to use mud as a weapon. Nothing vengeful, at least, and this thing looks like it's been following Dean for weeks."

Castiel picked up one of the more recent clippings. "Mud?" The article was about a break-in at a diner in Kentucky that had resulted in no money stolen, a great deal of property damage to their tables, and a thick, dark mud caked on almost every surface.

"Uh, yeah, it's the only thing these places have in common, besides Dean having been there." Sam pointed to the picture included with the article, at a spot that was particularly coated in mud. "I mean, right there? That's where Dean was sitting at that diner two weeks ago." He looked to Castiel for a reaction, adding, "Weird, right? What kind of thing can pinpoint your location so long after the fact?"

Castiel made a noncommittal noise, looking over the other articles. Diners, motels, even roadside gas stations – they all had the same story. A break-in nobody noticed, leaving the place coated with mud. "Have you seen the creature at all?"

"No, and that's the really weird thing," Sam said, turning back to his computer. "Nobody's seen the thing. None of the investigations into these break-ins have had a single witness, not even one spouting off stuff that sounds delusional."

"That's very… interesting." Putting down the clippings, Castiel leaned over Sam's shoulder to look at the computer screen. "What's this?" he asked, pointing at a picture of another muddy scene – this time with an unusual indentation in the mud. Sam scrolled down the page to reveal a caption under the picture: Footprint of Break-In Perpetrator.

"It's supposed to be a footprint the thing left behind," Sam said. He frowned, pointing at a piece of plastic in the corner of the picture marked at regular intervals. "But if this ruler's anything to go by, that foot's way too big to be human. That's gotta be, I don't know, a foot and a half, maybe two feet long?" He glanced at Castiel, who was frowning at the footprint. "Does it mean anything to you?"

"It might," he said. He tried to remember – what had Dean said? The angels were going to Christian sects for assistance. Was it possible, then, that they had gotten in contact with members of other Abrahamic religions? If so, they could have turned a creation of the earth from its intended purpose. It would explain the mud, and the superhuman size. But Sam was looking at him curiously, and Castiel reminded himself that this was all conjecture if he couldn't find a connection. "Sam, I know this may be hard to remember, but before this creature began following you, did you and Dean speak to a rabbi?"

"A rabbi?"

"Yes."

"Like, the Jewish version of a priest, kind of rabbi?"

"Yes."

"Uh…" Sam thought this over. "I'm not sure. It's not like they wear the outfit outside temple, or anything." Castiel huffed, still focused in on that footprint. Sam frowned. "Cas, what's a rabbi have to do with this thing? In my experience, rabbis are tiny old guys. Not the kind of person who can leave that size footprint."

"The creature is not a rabbi," Castiel said. Sam rolled his eyes, barely resisting making a comment. "Under the right circumstances, a rabbi can create new life from the earth. I'm not certain, but I believe that might be what happened here."

Opening a new web page, Sam started searching his general sources for references to rabbis. "And when you say 'new life', you mean…?"

"The rabbi takes a clay sculpture, shaped by the rabbi's hands, and performs such rituals on it that it becomes a living creature. And, to an extent, sentient."

"A living clay statue?" Sam asked.

"Yes," Castiel said, wandering away from the desk. He sat down on the far bed, watching the television Sam had left on with an absent-minded curiosity. "It's called–"

"A golem?" Surprised, Castiel nodded, glancing at Sam. He was reading over a different website, silently mouthing words that looked important. Castiel turned back to the television, keeping an ear focused on Sam in case he brought up something of interest. He wasn't particularly interested in television in general, but Dean and Sam paid enough attention to news programs that he thought it was worthwhile to look into them. This one was starting by commenting on the unusual weather being experienced world-wide. An apocalyptic omen, if they knew what they were looking for, but so few people did.

"So," Sam said, and Castiel's attention drifted away from the news anchor, who was talking about a political figure doing something immoral. "A rabbi creates a golem, and it obeys his commands? Like a glorified servant?"

"More or less," Castiel said. "There have been times when a golem was created for protective purposes – to keep the rabbi's followers from harm. But usually they are made to serve."

"Then what's the point of them?"

"What is the point of robots?" Castiel asked. "They serve a purpose so a human doesn't have to; they're stronger and faster, so they do the job better. And their creator feels a sense of pride in their efforts. It's not every rabbi that has learned how to create life." Sam hummed in the back of his throat; it was an agreeing sort of sound, which Castiel decided meant his point had been proven. He turned his attention back to the news, and found himself unable to look away.

"So, if this rabbi is working for Zachariah, you think the golem's been ordered to find Dean?"

"No," Castiel said. He could hear Sam shift in his seat, surprised. Nodding at the television screen, he said, "I think the golem has already found Dean."

"What?" Sam asked, jumping out of his chair. He sat down next to Castiel on the bed, and watched the news program unveil the answer with wide eyes.

_"…it seems that the muddy break-in perpetrator who's been crossing the country has left his mark here in Riverton."_

"That's right, Susan. Police are on the scene now, in downtown Riverton, where the perpetrator's characteristic muddy prints have been left on a car abandoned in an alley off of Front Street. We're still uncertain as to why the perpetrator has broken his habit of actually breaking in to his targets – it might be that this car has some significance to him that we aren't aware of."

"Police say they'll be able to tell after they've cleared the mud off the car, but estimate it will take a few hours to get the car cleaned up. We'll have more on the story then."

"In other news, is your house really safe from carbon monoxide? More after the break."

As the news went to a loud, cheesy commercial, Sam shared a worried glance with Castiel.

  


Further inspection of the room showed that the Hello Kitty pillow wasn't alone. There was another pillow shaped like a cat, one of some chick with ridiculously red hair and freaky looking eyes, and one with a cross-stitch that read, "Saving people, hunting things: the family business." And a large poster of the cover of Chuck's first book. He turned his head sideways and squinted at it. Was that supposed to be him, or Sam? It looked like that guy on romance novel covers – what's his name, Fabio, or something. Probably supposed to be Sam, he decided. The guy had long hair. Not long like Sam's, admittedly, more like girl hair long, but knowing Chuck he wasn't very specific with the descriptions.

"…n!" Dean would have ignored the sound, but he jumped a little at the echo coming from his waistline.

His phone was still on. He lifted it to his ear.

"Dean!"

And winced. "You don't have to _shout_, Becky. I'm not deaf."

"Oh. Sorry," she said. "I was just making sure you were okay. You weren't responding," she added pointedly.

"Well _sorry_," he said, rolling his eyes. "Next time somebody pulls an Angel Express on me without warning, I'll try to remember to keep my phone against my ear." He blinked, turning around. "Speaking of, where is the guy? I know he's not Cas, or this would have been a hell of a lot simpler."

Becky was silent.

"Becky?"

"I, uh," she said, the echo growing louder and more distinct. "I thought he was with you."

"Well clearly, he's not," Dean said. He frowned; now he could hear his own voice echoing. "And what's wrong with my phone? I keep hearing an echo."

"That's what happens when you're close enough to the other phone for it to pick you up," Becky explained, definitely _not_ over the phone. Dean spun around, and there she was, phone in one hand, suitcase in another.

He didn't know why he was so surprised.

"This is your place?" he asked, waving a hand around the room. She nodded, hanging up her phone. Dean hung up his and stuffed it in his pocket, trying to think of something to say. "It's, uh, nice? I guess."

"Thanks." She sat down on one of the couches, looking up at Dean expectantly. He glanced around, found nothing to catch his interest, and sat down on the other couch, carefully moving the Hello Kitty pillow out of his way. The couch sagged, and he sank back a little farther than he'd intended to. He shifted around to find a more comfortable position, pulling his phone out of his pocket when it started poking at his leg kind of painfully. By the time he found a better spot, he was uncomfortably aware of Becky's eyes still on him. His ears hot, he snapped, "What?" She quickly averted her eyes, a muttered apology on her lips.

Dean waved it off. "Forget it," he sighed. Then, looking around: "So, do you have any way of contacting your angel, or are we just going to sit here awkwardly until this thing finds me again?"

Becky shrugged. "He contacted me," she explained. After another moment of avoiding staring at him while obviously wanting to, she asked, "How did you know he was an angel?"

"I've flown Air Angel enough times to recognize a trip," Dean said. "What I don't know is _who_ is he? Have Sam and I met him before?"

"I doubt it," said a decidedly male, British voice on Dean's right. Dean jerked up in his seat, automatically fumbling for his leg knife, turning to face the new appearance. When he caught sight of the guy, he stopped. The angel was in a middle-aged guy's body, blond and pudgy, wearing the kind of bowtie Dean associated with really stuffy librarians. He smiled slightly, and said, "Hello, Dean. It's a pleasure."

Dean stared. "Sure it is," he said shortly. "And you are?"

"Aziraphale," the angel said. "I'm sorry for running off on you, but someone nearly broke into my shop. I had to check the wards, and thought you could use a moment to recover."

"Your shop?" He glanced at Becky, who was looking kind of ecstatic at the moment. "Angels have shops?"

Becky frowned at him. "You've obviously never read Neil Gaiman or Terry Pratchett," she said, in a very disappointed, superior-sounding tone. The names apparently had some great meaning for her, but they weren't ringing any bells in Dean's head.

He looked at her blankly. "Should I?"

"About that," Aziraphale said uncertainly. "Could you apologize to your prophet fellow about that? We never expected that it would be so popular."

Becky smiled, mood jumping around like a kid hopped up on sugar. "Sure!" she said, giggly. "I don't think Chuck will mind much, though; he wasn't going to try to get any more published, anyway."

Dean looked between them. "Those guys – they're prophets?"

"Only when they write something together," Becky said, looking at Aziraphale with something like glee in her eyes. "It's why they haven't written anything together since – that book is complete."

"Well," the angel said, shaking his head, "Not _really_ complete. Adam's part in things is done, but others of us are still involved, as you can see."

Becky nodded. "Obviously." She stood up, and Aziraphale took that as a cue to stand up as well. Feeling kind of dumb sitting next to a cat pillow, Dean was more than happy to get up himself. "Well," Becky said. "I guess this is it."

"I believe it is," Aziraphale said.

Pointing at her suitcase, she said, "I'm gonna go stay with Chuck for awhile, until you guys beat this golem. So, um, good luck! And," she added, turning to Dean. "Could you say 'hi' to Sam for me? I know he's doing okay, and I'm doing great with Chuck, but I think it's good to remind him that people still believe in him."

Dean closed his eyes, resisting an overwhelming desire to smack his head against a wall. He really hated the _Supernatural_ books. But when he opened his eyes, Becky was still there, looking hopeful and excited and… oh, what the hell _ever_. "Sure," he grunted. Her smile widened, and it became a real struggle to not roll his eyes.

"We had best be off, then," Aziraphale said, low and close to Dean's ear. Dean twitched, and took one long step away from the angel, turning to face him with a hand raised between their bodies.

"Do I need to have the personal space conversation with you too?" he asked, and Aziraphale snorted, muffling a laugh behind his hand.

"That will hardly be necessary," he said. "I'm not like your friend Castiel; I've been on Earth, among humans, for as long as there have been." He reached out and grabbed Dean's shoulder while he was still trying to process that, waving goodbye to Becky with his free hand. He squeezed down, and once again Dean lost all sense of sensations. The last thing he heard before everything disappeared was the faint, tinny noise of a phone ringing.

Becky pulled out her phone, watching a magazine flutter open and closed in the wake of the angel's disappearance. "Hello?" Walking out of the room, she smiled to herself. "Oh, hi Chuck!"

A tinny voice started berating her.

Rummaging around in her cabinets, she said, "Look, I know you _told_ me not get involved anymore, but _Aziraphale_ called _me_. I could hardly say no to him, you know – he's my favorite character in _Good Omens_."

Pulling out a box of cookies and a bag of chips, she continued, "I _know_ the golem's going to come here now, Chuck – my apartment's between Riverton and London. But it's okay, it won't get here for awhile, and I was thinking of taking a trip anyway." Stuffing her snacks into a bag and looking into her refrigerator, she asked, "_Where_? Well…"

The tinny voice over the phone got louder.

"Do you not want to _see_ me, is that it?" Tossing some drinks into her bag, she said, "You aren't the only person I know, you know – I could go visit anyone I wanted! I just thought…" She waited for the tinny voice to finish speaking, then added, "I _miss you_, Chuck. We never get to see each other, and I thought this might be a good time for us…"

The tinny voice sighed, and reluctantly agreed.

"_Really_?" Becky grinned. "Great! I'll be there in four hours, tops!" She hung up, spinning around her kitchen happily. Chuck was such a _good_ boyfriend when he put his mind to it.

Grabbing her snack bag and her suitcase, she walked out of her apartment, only going back for a moment to grab her keys. She locked the door, then on second thought left it open. She didn't need to see what the golem would do to locked doors when Zachariah wasn't there to open them for it.

Humming, she walked over to the elevator, nodding at a guy she didn't recognize – probably a new renter – as he left. He nodded back politely, and walked slowly down the hall.

Only once the elevator had shut, and was headed to the parking level with Becky inside, did he turn around and quickly run into Becky's apartment. Closing the door quietly behind him, Crowley searched the apartment with a careful eye.

Most of it was junk, but you never knew with Chuck's fans – what they thought was a _Supernatural_ collectible could actually be something of value. And, more importantly, Dean Winchester had just been here. Never knew what _he_ might accidentally leave behind. Like his car – the absence of which would have made tracking the Winchesters a hell of a lot harder, if Crowley hadn't nicked his coin before the police could find it.

A phone started to ring.

Not the house phone, though. A cell, somewhere. Crowley followed the sound to the couch, and found a small phone wedged between the cushions. Someone hadn't been very careful about where she left her things, it seemed.

He pulled the phone out, and raised his eyebrows at the Caller ID. Wrong "she", then. Though, this could come in handy soon, if the angel had done what Crowley _thought_ he'd done…

Ah, who was he kidding? Aziraphale had _definitely_ gone and gotten himself involved. The idiot.

Putting the phone on silence, Crowley slipped it into his pocket and left the apartment.

\----

Sam hung up with a frustrated sigh. "He's not picking up," he said unnecessarily. "Are you getting anything?"

Castiel shook his head, still listening to the dial tone. "Nothing." Sam sat down on the bed, his head in his hands. Hanging up his phone, Castiel approached him. "Sam," he said cautiously. "If Dean has been captured, all is not lost. We can still find Zachariah, get to him before he convinces Dean to say yes."

Sam laughed bitterly. "Zachariah?" he asked. "The last time I saw him, he ripped my _lungs_ out, Cas. How am I supposed to stand up to that?"

"You won't have to," Castiel said. "I've stolen Dean from under his nose before. I can do it again. I just need to know where he is."

"And how are we going to do that?" Sam demanded. "Cause last I checked? Dean not answering his phone means he can't tell us where he is."

Castiel looked at his phone contemplatively. "Remind me how this cell phone GPS works again? I think I might be able to use it."

Sam snorted. "I doubt our phone plan gets service on the Heavenly Plane."

"It doesn't," Castiel said, having had some experience with the concept. "But Michael cannot enter a vessel in Heaven. Dean has to be on Earth."

Slowly getting up, Sam nodded. "Alright. I'll find a site that can pick up GPS signals. We'll see what I can find." He turned on his computer, tapping his foot anxiously while it booted up.

"Sam," Castiel said hesitantly. Sam glanced at him, and whatever Castiel was going to say left his head. Instead, he was left with the words, "Thank you," which sounded stilted and awkward, even to him.

Sam shrugged. "He's my brother. I'm just glad you can help." The computer up and running, he turned his attention to finding the proper website.

Castiel looked around the room for something to do, and came up with nothing. Not that he had _nothing_ to do, exactly. He could continue his search for God. Or maybe return to London, investigate what strange creature had taken up residence in that bookstore and warded it beyond his understanding. Or look into the omens the news anchor had commented on some time ago.

He could do any of those, or a hundred other useful things, but he found himself preoccupied.

Dean was in danger, and that seemed to take precedent.

Considering his phone again, Castiel flipped it open with a flick of his wrist. Scrolling through a few screens, he picked a name out of his contacts list and dialed.

He listened to the dial tone ring and ring, and quietly hoped that Dean would pick up this time.


	2. Chapter 2

The golem walked up the stairs with no concern for the people running and screaming in its presence. Its ears had been built only superficially, and these humans did not speak in the tongue it knew. Neither were any of them its Creator, or the One who superseded its Creator.

It would have avoided their presence – as the One who superseded its Creator instructed after the first death – but at this location that desire proved impossible.

A door on the correct elevation presented itself, and the golem walked through it, the metal moving under the pressure of its Body and its Will. Another door close to the correct location was similarly moved, and the golem was soon in the presence of the Important Man's last location.

His presence filled the room, his gaze lingering on the walls and cotton-stuffed decorations, his body marking treads in the floor and imprints in cushions that the golem followed with its feet, its hands.

Everywhere that the Important Man had been, so too would it be.

It took ten seconds.

The new location of the Important Man was very far away, but not impossible to reach. It would have to move more quickly this time – the One who superseded its Creator was growing impatient with its lack of progress.

It left the room, faced with more of the humans. These were not screaming in panic, but screaming at it. Ignoring them, it proceeded on its way.

Several small projectiles struck its chest, momentarily stopping it from continuing.

The humans continued to shout at it, but it did not have time for this. The One who superseded its Creator would not be pleased, but necessary measures must be taken.

The golem stepped closer to the humans, hands held outwards. When it was close enough, it touched their respiratory openings, and filled them.

More projectiles were launched at it, but proved ultimately ineffective, as it went on to fill the openings of each of the humans attacking it.

When it had finished, it walked back down the stairs and out of the building, keeping to the shadows as it left the populated area.

\----

Dean blinked into awareness and stumbled, disoriented. He shook his head, slowly, but the dizziness didn't stop. Instead, it increased to such an extent that his stumbling became more like falling. A hand grabbed his arm with a familiar preternatural strength and _tugged_, and Dean found himself back on his feet without memory of how he got there. He turned, slower this time, and was somewhat relieved to see it was only Aziraphale. The angel pulled a short stool out from behind a desk and offered it to Dean, who sunk down on it reluctantly but thankfully.

"I'm sorry about that," Aziraphale was saying. "It's been a long time since I last did this; I'd forgotten how humans react to the change in pressure and whatnot over large distances."

Dean snorted. "What's an angel call a large distance?" he asked, voice only slightly slurred. Now that he was getting used to the difference, it wasn't so bad. He figured he'd be able to walk, run, or do a fucking pirouette same as normal, given a few more minutes to adjust.

"The Atlantic Ocean," Aziraphale said primly, leaving Dean's side now that he wasn't swaying on his seat. He walked to the other side of the room, which Dean guessed was part of a bookstore if the cash register and walls of books were anything to go by. Then what the angel had said sunk in, and Dean looked around with greater interest.

"No kidding? This is Jolly Old England?"

"Yes."

It was colder than America, Dean decided after a minute of observation. And it smelled weird – like fish and must, though the second one might just be because of the bookstore, which was probably the dustiest room Dean had ever seen that was still occupied. He was kind of disappointed. He'd thought a foreign country would be more… well, _foreign_.

But this wasn't the time for him to play at being a tourist. Blinking heavily, Dean sat up straighter and coughed. Aziraphale looked over at him, from where he was pulling books off a shelf. "So," he said, "This thing that's been following me? The, uh, what did Becky call it?"

"A golem."

"Right. That. What are we gonna do about that?" Aziraphale stared at him, confused. Dean sighed, and clarified. "How are we going to kill it?"

"Kill a golem?" Aziraphale asked disbelievingly. "Why would you want to do that?"

"Uh, because _it_ was trying to kill _me_?"

Aziraphale scoffed. "Oh, don't be ridiculous." He waved a hand at Dean, and then turned back to his books. "It was trying to catch you."

"_Catch_ me?" Dean repeated. That was kind of new.

"Golems aren't, strictly speaking, supernatural creatures as you know them," Aziraphale said, pulling a few more books off his shelf. "They aren't something you'll find a lot of mythology about, because the people who know the most about them keep them a secret. It's only rogue golems, the ones that kill their masters or go on rampages, that people have noticed." At Dean's confused look, the angel added, "They're created by humans, to do things for humans. Specifically, by rabbis who have studied the Sefer Yetzirah."

"The Sefer what?"

"The Sefer Yetzirah." Aziraphale took one of the books out of his stack and slid it down the desk to come to a rest by Dean. He opened it, flipping through the pages carefully – whatever it was made of, it was older and stiffer than any paper he'd ever touched. It was all written in thick curls of squared off lines – Hebrew, probably. Some of it looked kind of familiar. He'd probably seen Hebrew before, on a hunt sometime. "It's related to the Jewish concept of Kabbalah, religious mysticism. Trying to find a connection between an eternal, mysterious God and a mortal, comprehendible world." Dean scoffed, and Aziraphale frowned, looking up at him. "Rabbis used it to perform miracles back in the day – creating sacrificial animals, summoning things, even creating life."

"Like golems." Dean turned a page, and found himself staring at a picture of circles connecting by lines, Hebrew words written in the circles. He traced the line that had been inked in a shimmery gold color, which connected all of the circles, and wondered what it meant.

"_Only_ golems," Aziraphale corrected. "No matter how great their understanding of the universe, humans can't quite match what He did. So they can create life from the earth, as He made Adam, but it lacks something."

Dean snorted. "Free will?"

Aziraphale stilled. "Among other things," he said after a minute.

Dean flipped through the rest of the pages quickly, slamming the back cover loudly against the rest of the book when he was done. Aziraphale winced sympathetically for the text. "Well, fat lot of good free will's done us," he muttered.

Aziraphale put his books down and walked over to Dean. Taking the Sefer Yetzirah in careful hands, he leaned down and made eye contact with Dean. Wincing, but unable to avoid it, Dean glared at the angel. What was it with angels and eye contact? This was almost worse than Cas, though; Cas either looked at you like he was trying to understand you or like he was trying to see through you, but this guy looked at Dean like he already understood him, but was looking anyway because he was curious. When he blinked, breaking their gaze, Dean couldn't hold back a sigh of relief.

"Free will is invaluable, Dean," Aziraphale said quietly. "Some angels may try to make you think otherwise, but the choices you make, that your brother makes, that any of us make, can easily destroy or save the world."

Dean shifted where he sat, looking away. "Yeah, well, all my choices these days seem to be destroying it. The angels are so convinced I've gotta let this happen. Maybe I do. Maybe that's the only way to save people."

The angel made a sympathetic noise, taking his book back to the shelves. Putting it back, he said, "Heaven has been wrong about the Apocalypse before, Dean. If we had the time, I'd introduce you to an Antichrist who said no, and made it stick." Picking up the stack of books he'd collected, he brought them over to Dean, dropping them with a loud thunk. "But we don't, so you'll have to accept the next best thing."

Dean looked up at the stack of books warily. "And what's that?" he asked.

Aziraphale pulled a small mass publication paperback book off the top of his stack. He handed it to Dean with a grin. "Read this."

Dean looked at the book. The names Becky mentioned before were written across the top, advertised as "_New York Times_ Bestselling Authors". Maybe she was right about being supposed to know their names. Then again, Dean thought to himself, there are a lot of definitions of bestselling. Beneath their names was a sketched drawing of a middle-aged guy – an angel, if the halo and wings were supposed to be any clue. He had a book with a red crosshatched cover on his lap. Suspicious, Dean looked up at Aziraphale's stack of books.

"I'm afraid the cover artist wasn't quite _that_ exact," Aziraphale said, amused. Caught, Dean turned back at the book, this time at the actual title.

"_Good Omens_?" he asked. "Sounds like an oxymoron to me."

"That's basically the point," Aziraphale said, a small grin on his face. "Just read it, please. It shouldn't take you very long, and it will help with things." He took the top book off his own stack and started reading it, at an inhumanly fast rate. Dean watched in something like awe for a minute. "Get to it!" Aziraphale said without looking up, and Dean opened to the first page.

_In the Beginning_, the book said. Well. Good as place to start as any. Dean turned the page and started reading.

\----

Dean still hadn't answered his phone. Castiel thought he might have lost count of how many times he tried calling, listening to that dial tone chime and chime, until the woman's voice said that the phone number was unavailable. He looked over at Sam, hunched over the computer, trying yet another site. Because the one before it hadn't seen the GPS, and neither had the one before that.

It didn't make sense. Castiel knew for a fact that vessels could only be taken on the Earthly plane, and Sam assured him that the GPS in Dean's phone should work whether it was turned on or off. Unless the phone had been destroyed –

No. No, he wouldn't think like that. Now wasn't the time for it. He dialed Dean's number again, his eyes on Sam and his ear against the phone. The dial tone chimed, and chimed, and chimed. He sighed and hung up, not even bothering to wait it out this time. He would just have to have faith in Sam, he decided. Sam would find Dean with this GPS, and Castiel would go to Dean, and he would save him, and Dean would be safe, and things would be… not alright, but definitely improved.

Sam froze where he sat, slowly saying, "Hey, Cas, I think I've got something." He waved Castiel over, pointing at a dot on a map. "It's a weak signal, and it's only accurate within a hundred feet, but it looks like Dean is there. Or, at least, his phone is." Castiel concentrated on the image, on the name of the town marked on the map, and found where it was on the globe. A good distance away, for a person on foot, but no trouble for an angel.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," Castiel said, just as his phone rang.

He pulled the phone out of his pocket, looked between it and Sam. Sam looked right back at him, as confused an expression on his face as Castiel felt.

"Cas?" Sam asked cautiously. "Who else besides us has your phone number?"

"Bobby might," he said uncertainly, but trailed off when he opened the phone. "The caller ID says Dean," he said.

"Answer it," Sam said immediately.

"It might be a trap," Castiel said, but Sam shook his head.

"Dean and I have codes. I'll know if it's a trap."

Still uncertain, Castiel answered the call. He lifted the phone to his ear and, cautious, said, "Dean?"

The voice on the other end was dark and amused. And familiar. "Afraid not, angel," the British accented voice said laughingly.

The blood pounding through Castiel's vessel seemed to slow, and grow cold, and louder with each heartbeat.

"Crowley."

Sam jumped to his feet, hissing, "What?"

"Got it in one!" the demon cheered. "Not bad. You're a step above those morons you're working with, aren't you?"

"Where is Dean Winchester?" Castiel asked.

"Not here," Crowley said. "Though I think you have a guess as to where he might be."

Castiel frowned. "If I did, I would already be there."

"Oh, come on!" Crowley sounded disappointed. "_Think_ a little, Castiel. You were just there, I _know_ you were."

"How?" Castiel asked, silently wondering if it really could be that simple.

"Felt you make a move on the wards."

"What is it?" Sam whispered. "Did Crowley say where Dean is?"

Castiel's jaw was hanging open, he realized. He shut it, saying, "But that presence I felt, that wasn't just demonic energy. That was–"

"Angelic, yeah." The pleasure in Crowley's tone felt like something unpleasant crawling up Castiel's spine. He shivered. "Where did you think I learned those Enochian markings, back then?"

"I assumed…" Castiel swallowed heavily. "Fallen angels would still retain the memory of the sigils. Azazel, maybe, or–"

Crowley hissed. The sound was long and drawn out, less a human imitation of a snake's sound than the authentic sound itself. "Ooh, nice guess, but no. The stuff they remember is so old and archaic, it's hardly effective anymore. Angels still in Heaven's good books, on the other hand? They know a _lot_ more."

"Who have you been using?" Castiel asked, his voice low and rough.

"Why don't you go visit Mr. Fell's used bookshop and ask?" Crowley said, still amused. Then he hung up.

Castiel lowered his phone slowly. Sam looked him over, worried but clearly uncertain as to what he should do. Castiel sat down on the desk chair heavily, eyes staring at nothing. "Crowley is a more ruthless demon than even I had imagined," he said, feeling a strange separation from the words. "He has tricked an angel – who, I don't know – into sharing angelic secrets with him. And it appears that Dean is with that angel."

Sam's brow furrowed. "So, is the angel on Crowley's side, or Heaven's?"

Castiel shook his head slowly. "I don't know," he said. "I don't know if this might be a trap for me, but I have to check. The angel is in London," he added. "If I don't make it back, then it's likely neither will Dean."

"No," Sam said, knowing where this was going.

"You won't be on your own. You can still go to Bobby, and there are other hunters are working to stop the Apocalypse."

"No, I can't do that," Sam insisted. "I've tried it before, and I can't do this without Dean."

"I'm sorry, Sam," Castiel said, standing again, "But you'll have to be ready to do exactly that. If it comes to that." He pocketed his phone carefully, and looked Sam in the eye. "Hopefully, I'll be in contact."

Sam's expression was dark, worry and fear mixing to create something potent and dangerous. "Yeah."

Between one blink of the eye and the next, Castiel was gone.

Sam kicked one of the beds. "Damn it!"

Dean knew he should be feeling more uncomfortable reading this book. It was a prophetic book, just like Chuck's, which meant that there were a bunch of people out there somewhere whose privacy had been invaded, lives turned into fiction, just like his and Sam's lives were turned into fiction.

The thing was, Chuck couldn't write. These guys wrote kind of weird – Dean put it off as British humor, which he had never understood – but he couldn't deny that it was good writing. They kind of deserved that "Bestseller" title after all.

In the middle of one of the trivia game scenes with the horsemen (like he hadn't figured that out all of sixty pages in, the first time they were referenced?), he was interrupted by an odd sound. It wasn't something he could entirely here, like a buzzing just this side of supersonic, but it wasn't quite as shrill as that. It was, however, persistent, and distracting enough to make him set down the book and look around.

Aziraphale looked up from his current read (the fifth one down in the stack, each finished book leaving him more and more frustrated), frowning. "Oh, what now?" he asked impatiently. Another sound started up, this one the clang of an old-fashioned telephone. With a sigh, Aziraphale marked his page and shut his book, walking over to the phone with an anxious twitchy movement to his pace.

The buzz continued. If Dean concentrated hard enough, he could hear it more clearly. Focusing on that, he turned his head one way and another, until he could guess the direction it was coming from. Standing up (and pleased that he could move so quickly without dizzying repercussions now), he made his way towards the source of the sound – the front door of the bookstore. A peek through the glass of the door showed a surprisingly familiar face, and he opened the door without a second thought.

"Hey, Cas," he said with a grin. "Come to join the party?"

"_Dean_." Castiel's face crumbled, and Dean's grin faltered.

"You okay?"

He sighed shakily, and recovered his composure. "I'm just glad that you are."

Dean shrugged. "Yeah, I'm fine. Aziraphale – the angel that brought me here – he's got a pretty nice place going on. You know, for a bookstore."

"Aziraphale? I don't know that name." Castiel grabbed Dean's shoulder. "Dean, I know the name of every angel. You're not safe here."

Dean shrugged his hand off. "Cas, I'm pretty sure this guy's on our side. Look," he held out the book. "Book of prophecy, all about him. Him and Crowley, actually."

"Crowley?" Castiel's expression was dark again, and Dean frowned, wondering what the hell Castiel had expected to find here. "Dean, if this Aziraphale is involved with Crowley, you know he can't be trusted."

"I know."

"Demons and angels _don't_ work well together."

"I know," Dean repeated. "Cas, trust me here." Castiel's face stayed blank. "_Cas_."

Castiel sighed. "You know I do, Dean."

"Good," Dean said. "Good. Now," he continued, "I don't trust Crowley as far as I can throw him. Wanting Earth safe doesn't mean wanting _us_ safe, you know? But Aziraphale wants us safe too. He's, I don't know, kind of like you. And he's been sneaking around behind Heaven's back, helping us. That thing that was hunting me down, that golem, is probably a good hundred, maybe even two hundred feet under the Atlantic right now, trying to get at me. It's not gone for good, but it's been delayed a lot. Maybe long enough to find a way to stop it."

Castiel shifted under Dean's gaze. "Dean," he started, but was quickly cut off by a loud, "Oh _no_."

It was Aziraphale, staring at the two of them, a look of dismay on his face. Castiel stared at him, recognition sweeping across his face. "Izrafel?" he asked.

"Oh _hell_," Aziraphale said, running back to his books. "You shouldn't have come here," he said, pushing half the books into Castiel's arms and half into Dean's. "You really shouldn't have come here." His eyes kept flickering up to the ceiling worriedly. Castiel followed his line of sight and visibly recoiled when he saw… whatever it was Aziraphale had seen. All Dean saw when he looked up was a dirty water stain that looked kind of like an octopus.

"You have to hurry," Aziraphale continued. "Take those and get out of here, go back where his brother is. You should be able to find something in there, if you look hard enough."

Castiel nodded, shifting the books in his hands to get a hand free to press against Dean's forehead. Aziraphale groaned, staring up, and hissed, "_Quickly_," before slamming a hand on each Castiel and Dean's shoulders, and squeezing. Everything disappeared much faster this time – Dean would almost call it instantaneous, except he had a second before he vanished to hear Aziraphale mutter a frustrated, "_Damn_ it, Crowley."

The angel returned to his phone call, still muttering curses under his breath.

Crowley was laughing. "Did you enjoy my little surprise, then?"

"_That_," Aziraphale started, "was _dangerous_, Crowley. Heaven has been keeping an eye on me since this Apocalypse started – I may have not been in trouble after last time, but my superiors have a long memory."

"Yeah, yeah," Crowley said, "Why do you think I'm in the States? It's Hell's way of keeping an eye on _me_, this bloody job. I'm lucky they haven't caught on to what I'm doing."

"As am _I_," Aziraphale insisted. "And if we keep it up, we'll both be caught, and then we'll be no good to anyone."

"Nah," the demon said smoothly, "I'll just go on the run. Get the job finished myself, if you know what I mean."

"That – Crowley, that's suicide!"

"No, it's pragmatic," Crowley corrected. Aziraphale sputtered a protest, but was quickly interrupted by, "Now, don't you go doing it too – it's far easier for demons to abandon their Lord than angels, just look at the wreck Castiel's become."

"Well, of _course_ I won't do it, but Crowley –"

"Uh uh, can't talk me out of it now. I've decided, for better or worse."

"Crowley—"

His voice serious for once, the demon said, "It's been good knowing you, Aziraphale."

"Do you call just to make me worry about you?" Aziraphale asked wearily.

"Maybe," Crowley teased, before hanging up.

Aziraphale sighed, hanging up on his end, and turned to his books. He caught sight of a small one with a red, crosshatched cover, sitting where he'd had his books on Jewish mysticism. Feeling a terrible sense of foreboding, he picked it up and flipped through the pages for a moment. Coming to a stop in the middle, he skimmed the section quickly.

Well. That meant – this was – hm. Words were failing Aziraphale. That was unusual.

After a moment's consideration, he decided was the best way to describe the situation was an emphatic "_Fuck_," and picked up the phone again.

\----

Dean became aware at about the same time he became aware that he was falling. A hand grabbed his arm and he sagged into the grip, thinking that it was odd how often this was happening to him lately. It was almost becoming a normal part of Air Angel.

The grip on his arm wasn't as strong as Aziraphale's, though, and he fell out of the grasp and onto the floor. The painful, _painful_ floor. Dean groaned, rolling off of the sharp edges, onto more sharp edges, rolling again and again until he was clear of the edges. The books he'd dropped, he realized. Well, if that wasn't karma for you. Sitting up slowly, he leaned against the nearest flat surface – a wall, by the feel of it – and tried to figure out where he was.

The hand was on his shoulder, though, shaking it, and that was making it a little hard for him to concentrate.

"Dean!" a voice was shouting. "Dean, are you alright? Can you hear me?" He groaned, moving away from the sound.

Another voice said, "I think you might be encroaching on his personal space," and Dean couldn't help the snort of laughter that escaped him at that. He leaned his head against the wall, tilting until he could see the tan blur that was slowly sharpening into Castiel's trench coat. It only made him a _little_ dizzy, so it was okay.

"Like you have room to talk," Dean said, laughing to himself. Castiel made a sound that a generous person might call a chuckle, but which Dean knew was as close as the angel would ever get to laughing.

The hand on his shoulder was still there. When it wasn't shaking him, it was kind of nice. Almost comforting, just resting there.

Oh. It was Sam's hand. That made sense.

The voice that went with Sam's hand had gotten quieter, was asking, "This doesn't happen after you fly us places – what's wrong with him?"

"Nothing is wrong with him," Castiel said. "Izrafel just flies differently. His method is faster, but is less concerned with… passenger safety, you might call it. Even less so when he doesn't come along for the ride."

"His name's _Aziraphale_, Cas," Dean corrected, slurring only slightly over the angel's name. "You're not saying it right."

"I'm calling him by the name he was given, not the alteration he chose for himself."

"Hold on," Sam said, "_Aziraphale_? Not like the Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman character Aziraphale?"

"You know _Good Omens_," Dean said faintly. "Becky would be proud."

"What?" A second of Sam's hands made its way to Dean's face, kind of holding him up. He blinked, slowly, and tried to focus in on his brother's face. "Dean, what are you talking about?"

He blinked again. "I'm not sure. I think maybe I wasn't supposed to fly Air Angel twice in a day." He squinted up at Sam. "I'm tired, Sammy."

"Dean."

He blinked again again, except for the part where your eyes open at the end. He didn't do that bit. Though that was probably just called closing your eyes.

"Dean!"


	3. Chapter 3

Castiel took his hand off Dean's head, nodding to himself. "He was right," he said. "That method of travel is dizzying and exhausting. He should be okay, given long enough to rest." He looked up at Sam. "Sam, we don't have that kind of time. That golem was headed towards London, because that's where Dean was, but now that he's here, the golem will know it too. It will turn around, and whatever ground we gained thanks to Izrafel's stunt will be quickly lost."

Sam sighed, sinking into a chair. "So what are we gonna do, shove Dean in the backseat and start driving?"

"Start driving what?" Castiel asked. "Your car is still being cleaned of mud and debris by the local police, who I think may take exception to your license plate once it's been uncovered."

Sam swore under his breath. "Then what?"

Castiel picked up one of the books Dean had dropped and handed it to Sam. "Start researching. Izrafel was sure that the answer to our problem with the golem would be found in one of these books."

Sam opened the book cautiously, flipping through the pages. He looked up at Castiel, concerned. "Wait, why don't you already know how to stop one?"

Castiel looked away, picking up another of the books. "The knowledge to create a golem was part of a book of spiritual information left to men. It was not made for angels to know. It was not something we should need to know." Reading over the book quickly, he added, "Only the most pious of rabbis should be able to create a golem. It was never expected that one would need to be brought down against its master's will."

"Because pious men shouldn't want to cause harm to others," Sam said, filling in the blanks.

Castiel nodded. "Exactly."

Sam sighed. "And of _course_ the first one that does want to cause harm wants to cause it to _us_."

"That's, uh, just your luck?"

Sam looked up. Castiel stared at him uncertainly. After a minute, Sam snorted, and Castiel relaxed. "Yeah," Sam agreed. "That's just our luck."

\----

Several dozen feet under the Atlantic Ocean, the golem paused.

Its orders had been to find the Important Man, and it had been doing this by visiting every location the Important Man had visited. The place the golem was walking towards had been one such place, but now the Important Man was elsewhere. In the other direction.

A creature approached the golem as it considered what action to take. To go to the last location the Important Man had visited would be following his prior movements, and consistency was important to it. To go to where the Important Man was now would be faster, and the One who superseded the Creator wanted the Important Man found quickly.

The creature prodded it.

The golem absentmindedly touched its nearest opening and filled. The creature did not make as much noise as the humans had, which was a good change.

It had decided.

Turning around, it headed back in the direction it had came, walking ever closer to the Important Man it had been created to find.

\----

Castiel's phone rang.

He pulled it out of his pocket, frowning. "I think I'm starting to get sick of this phone," he said. "It brings me nothing but bad news." He answered it, an anticipatory frown on his face. "Hello, Crowley," he said coldly.

Sam watched expectantly, but Castiel made a motion at the book that Sam took to mean 'I've got this, you figure out what we're doing'. Paging through the index, he hoped absently that this book would be the one, that golem would be right there under 'g', and that right on the page listed would be instructions for how to kill one.

"The way _I_ saw it, Izrafel wasn't very happy to see me."

Nope, no entry for golem. Next, Judaic mythology. Kabbalah. Rabbinical magic.

"He seemed to think Heaven would notice a rogue angel appearing on his doorstep."

Nothing even resembling them. A quick glance over the other indexed entries showed nothing promising, and Sam put aside the book in favor of another one.

"Get to the point, Crowley. We don't have time to play your games like last time."

Oh, _great_. This one didn't even have an index. He paged through it, sighing when he realized there was no alphabetical order to it either. He'd have to look through this one the hard way – page by page.

"Really? And you're sure of this _why_, exactly?"

Page by page of necromancy, love potions and poisons, a hundred different ways to kill with a silver blade. It was practically the occult version of Cosmo. Sam winced at one particularly graphic drawing displayed what you could do to punish a cheating lover.

"One last question. Why are you _really_ helping us?"

Thankfully, this book was shorter than the others. He dropped it to the side, dragging a large, heavy one into his lap.

"…no, I don't think I would believe you. Well, if you're telling the truth, I guess you've lost your chance at surviving this war."

This one had an index. Good. He looked through it, puzzling over the overly fancy script for a long moment before he realized that it wasn't the script that was hard to decipher, but the language. It was all in French. He put it aside for Castiel to look at. Castiel picked it up and started reading through it, having hung up on the demon after his last comment.

"So," Sam asked, paging through an English language index. "What did Crowley have to say?"

"He claims to have a way of tracking the golem. Says at the speed it's traveling now, it'll be here in an hour, maybe two at best." He frowned over a stained page of parchment. "He suggested that we should hurry, unless we want to all get caught, and killed by the angels. Again."

Sam snorted. "How nice of him to think of us."

"He also seemed to think," Castiel added, "That we won't find what we're looking for in time."

"Really."

"Yes. He said death would remove us before the truth could arrive."

Sam frowned. "Does that seem weirdly phrased to you?"

"It's a code," said neither Sam nor Castiel. The two of them turned at once to see Dean pulling himself into a seated position against the backboard of the bed. He laughed weakly. "I'll be damned, he actually _is_ on our side." He swayed where he sat, and would have fallen over if Sam and Castiel hadn't gotten to either side of him and grabbed on to his arms. Dean laughed again.

"What do you mean, a code?" Castiel asked. "What do death and truth have to do with a golem?"

"Asks the guy who's never actually _seen_ the damn thing," Dean said. Leaning heavily on his arm, he said, "Let me go, I'm fine. Get a book that has some Hebrew in it, somewhere." Castiel dropped Dean's arm to look through the books for one in that language, leaving Sam to grip Dean's other arm a little tighter when he wavered.

"I didn't know you knew any Hebrew."

"I don't," Dean grunted. "But Aziraphale had a book in Hebrew – the Sefer something or other – and I was thinking some of it looked familiar. I just realized how."

Castiel placed a book on Dean's lap, open to a page of the ancient language. "Here," he said. Dean leaned over the book, squinting at the symbols. Slowly, he pointed to three letters.

"What do those mean?" he asked. Castiel mouthed a few sounds, shaking his head helplessly.

"Nothing, they mean nothing. It's a nonsense combination of letters."

"No," Dean said, "No, I know that's the right ones. Those are–"

"Dean," Sam said suddenly. "Hebrew is read right to left. You've got the word backwards." He turned to Castiel, whose eyes had lit up at Sam's comment.

"_Alef, mem, taw_," he said carefully, pleased. "Your word is _emet_. It means truth."

Dean smiled to himself. "What'd I tell you? What'd I _tell_ you?"

"Okay, Dean," Sam said, giving in to Dean's kind of infectious grin. "You told us. It's a code."

"Yes," Castiel agreed. "But a code for what?"

"Those letters – that word, _emet_ – were carved into that golem's head," Dean said. "Now, I'm thinking that's gotta mean something."

"How does 'death' fit in?" Sam wondered. He and Dean looked at Castiel, who looked like he'd just figured out the million dollar answer.

"_Met_ means death."

Dean smiled. "Just the one letter difference?" he asked. Castiel nodded. "Well, the way it sounds to me, we just have to remove that first letter and the golem will drop dead."

Sam frowned. "You really think it's that easy?"

"Aw, Sammy, don't be such a Debbie Downer," Dean said, grinning, just as Castiel said, "I wouldn't call that easy."

Sam and Dean shared a confused frown, then looked at Castiel.

"We have to get close enough to the golem to remove the mark," he explained.

The room went quiet.

"Well, shit."

\----

The three of them sat in that room, silent, for a long time. Once in awhile, one of them would look up to speak, an idea on the tip of their tongue, but would give up the thought as pointless before it ever got out. Finally, one of them said the thing they'd been avoiding all along.

"I'm doing it," Dean said.

"The hell you are!" Sam said, standing up to look down at his brother. "Dean, you can barely stand, there's no way you can hold your own long enough against this thing to get to its head."

"It's coming after me, so I'm doing it," Dean repeated. "If either of you do it, it'll just try to get you out of the way. If I do it, it's already got what it wants–"

"And it will call down Zachariah to come get you," Castiel interjected. He stared Dean down in that way he could never manage to avoid. "Dean, none of our options right now are perfect, but you doing this is our worst chance of survival."

"Geez, Cas, way to let me down gently," he muttered.

"I should do it," Castiel said.

"_Hell_ no."

"I'm with Dean on this one, Cas," Sam said carefully. "The angels have no reason to let you live. If you get caught by the golem, they're not gonna let you go."

"Then I will not be caught by the golem."

Dean snorted at that. "And you're sure you can keep that promise?" He caught Castiel's eyes when he tried to look away, and stared him down in the way the angel could never avoid. Quid pro quo, or something like it. Castiel sighed, reluctantly admitting defeat.

"No."

Sam clapped his hands together decisively. "Then we're settled."

"Yes."

"I'm doing it."

"Ye – wait, Sam, _no_."

"Dean, I'm the only one of us they want to live that they don't want to capture. I'm not half-comatose, like you, and I'm not being put at risk. You and Cas keep behind me, it'll keep the golem coming at me. I'll get the mark off its head, it'll collapse, and we're done. We can go steal back the Impala in a day or two, and we're back on the road. Simple."

Dean frowned. He hated it when Sam pulled logic on him like this. "Okay," he said warily, "But the _second_ I think you're in trouble, Cas and I step in. Okay?"

"Dean–"

"_Sam_."

He sighed. "Fine. Okay."

"Great," Dean said. "Let's get ready, then."

\----

The golem paused. A metal contraption squealed to a halt and made a noise.

The Important Man had moved again. Not as far, this time, but again suddenly.

The noise repeated itself, several times in fast succession. The golem pressed a hand to the contraption's nearest opening, but filling it did nothing to stop the noise. If anything, it grew louder, and accompanied by a more human sound, screaming.

It would go to the new location, the golem decided. Speed was more highly prized than completeness.

More metal contraptions made noises as the golem changed direction, the one it had filled not moving as it made noise.

\----

Sam parked the car they'd jacked from the hotel parking lot. He got out and looked around, asking, "Does this place look deserted enough to you?"

Castiel inspected the wide open space of the empty field. "It should suffice."

Sam shared a glance with Dean, both of them internally rolling their eyes.

"We should prepare," Castiel said, reaching into the backseat of the car. He held out a knife to each of the Winchesters, adding a gun when they took the knives. "These won't be of much use against a golem," he explained, taking the demon-killing knife for himself. "There aren't any weapons that can be used against them effectively. Hopefully, they will hold it off long enough for Sam to get close enough to remove the _aleph_."

"Hopefully?" Dean repeated skeptically, eyes narrowed at Castiel.

Castiel stared back at him. "Hopefully. I did say this would not be easy," he added.

"Yeah, yeah." Dean rolled his eyes, switching out the salt rounds in his gun for normal bullets. He looked up at Sam, who was doing the same. "You still okay with doing this?"

"Dean," Sam started.

"Yeah, I know, "you're fine"," Dean interrupted. "I'm just checking, okay?"

Sam sighed. "Okay." He looked back down at his gun, then at Dean again. "Actually, you know what? It's _not_ okay." Dean glanced up. "Dean, I know you still don't trust me completely, but can't you at least accept that I know what I'm doing here?"

"Sam–"

"Quiet."

Sam and Dean glanced between each other and Castiel, silently agreeing to deal with it later. "What is it, Cas?"

Castiel turned, looking off into the distance. "It's coming."

"The golem?" Sam stood up, a weapon in each hand.

Castiel nodded, moving to Dean's side. The hand on Dean's shoulder was a sign he needed to move, but it could wait. "Sam?"

"Yeah, Dean?"

"If it makes you feel better, Becky believes in you."

Sam snorted. "Thanks, man."

Two sets of wings fluttering later, Castiel was at Sam's side. "Dean is nearby," he said. "Close enough to draw the golem's attention, without putting him in immediate danger."

"Great," Sam said, watching a dark figure in the distance approach. Then: "I didn't say it before, but I don't just need Dean. I kind of want you to stick around, too."

Surprised, Castiel frowned at Sam. "Thank you?"

"Sure." Nodding his head at the golem, he said, "So, you know, you'd better hang back. I don't want this golem catching you any more than I want it to catch Dean."

"Of course," Castiel said, and then he wasn't next to Sam.

It was just Sam and the golem now.

"Alright," Sam muttered to himself as it approached. He couldn't see too much yet, but what he could see was _big_. "Bring it."

There was another human in front of the golem. He wasn't running from it, or screaming at it. He was just… there. The golem tried to walk around him, but he moved in front of it each time.

The Important Man was not very far away. It did not have the time, or the patience, to wait for this human to tire of looking at it. The golem stepped closer to the human, arm outstretched, reading to fill his openings.

When it got close to the human, he struck out with a sharp piece of metal. The golem was surprised, momentarily, but the first attempt to harm it merely left a cut in its clay. It was a matter of a moment to fill in the gap, and its arm was whole again.

The second attempt to harm it, now that it was expected, was brushed off as easily as a door. The human expressed some surprise at that, moving away from the golem, but it was already tired of this. Pushing forward, it placed a hand over the largest opening on the human's face.

A projectile, like the ones other humans had used on the golem before, struck its head. This was even less of an annoyance than the projectiles that struck its chest had been – it did not even penetrate the clay.

The golem filled the human. He screamed, still the most unfortunate noise it had ever heard.

Then the human was pulled from its grip. Momentarily stunned by the action, the golem paused.

Another creature – not a human, this one, though it resembled one – had had the strength to remove the human from its grasp. The human was on the ground now, gagging and choking. It had not had the time to completely fill him, unfortunately.

After it dealt with this new creature, it would rectify that.

The golem rushed at the creature, which was armed with another of the metal implements. It struck out at the golem, and its strikes were somehow more potent – it took more of the golem's concentration to fill in the gaps created by the cuts, and the metal would not move under its Will.

What was more, the golem realized as it fought with the creature, was that it was much like the One who superseded the Creator. Its nature was lesser, but there was a glow about it, much like there had been around the One who superseded the Creator.

This was concerning. Had the One who superseded the Creator desired to change his instructions for it, and sent this creature to inform it?

No, the golem decided. This was unrelated. It could deal with this creature as it dealt with the others.

It held out a hand and reached for the largest opening, faster than the creature had been expecting –

Only for the creature to have disappeared.

The golem turned, trying to find the creature, but it had somehow escaped the golem's sight.

No, the golem corrected after a moment. It was on the golem's back.

It made another human noise, quieter than the screaming the golem knew best, then placed a hand to the golem's forehead and rubbed.

The golem wondered what the creature was expecting this to do. Given how it reacted to the golem grabbing its hand and throwing it off, it must have expected _something_ to occur. But as the golem stood over the creature, hands over all of the openings on its head, nothing happened.

Behind the golem, something spoke. Again, meaningless. The golem ignored the noise, began filling the creature. It was turning out to be more and more like a human than the golem had expected – it was shaped like a human, made noises like a human, fought like a human, and would stop like a human.

Maybe it had been human all along, and the golem had imagined that Heavenly glow?

But, as the golem filled the human-like creature, it felt something, which was entirely new to it.

It felt… an itch.

It tried to ignore the sensation, but the itch quickly became unbearable, and worse than that unitchable, as the golem could not determine its source.

"Over here," a voice said helpfully.

It turned away from the creature at the sound of not-Hebrew. The source of the tongue was a short creature, at once as human-like as the one lying on the ground, but not at all resembling the One who superseded the Creator. Rather than glowing, it seemed to absorb all the light around it.

It required destruction.

"You see," the creature said, "that itch you're feeling? Is just how you would have felt if that angel hadn't given you a face lift. And now that you don't have it, you're as vulnerable as the rest of us, if we know your secret. And, believe me, I _know_." It approached the golem with the intent to fight, just as all the others before had fought it. And it would fail, just as all the others before had.

The golem stepped towards the creature, hand outstretched, all its sights focused on it.

So the golem did not see the knife through its neck coming.

It turned to face the one who had come closest to destroying it.

It was the Important Man.

This was perfect, the golem decided. Turning away from the creature, it replaced its head on its neck, and reached out for the Important Man. It might not have destroyed the creature that required destruction, or taken care of the other two who had interfered with its mission, but now – now – it could complete that mission regardless.

All it had to do was touch the Important Man, and –

And a hand was on its forehead again.

No. A thumb. Rubbing away at something over its eye.

What was there? The golem had never looked at itself before, but it suddenly wondered what was there that these people wanted to rub? What was –

What were they doing? The golem felt –

It felt –

It –

\----

Dean looked at the smudge on his thumb and rubbed the dirt on his jeans, though it didn't stop him from feeling freakishly dirty. He watched as the golem collapsed under its own superhuman weight, crumbling once again into dust and dirt. But mostly mud.

Crowley walked up to him, a squinty, scrunched up look on his face. "Hate Enochian," he said. "_Hate_ it. Makes my mouth go all numb and tingly." He spat, and shuddered. "You're welcome, by the way."

"Thanks," Dean said warily, edging away from where Crowley had spat. "How'd you know–?"

"You were here? Chuck Shurley doesn't encrypt his computer. How to help you? Aziraphale. He says sorry, by the way. Missed a book." Dean raised an eyebrow at that, and Crowley shrugged. "It's what he said. He also says you might not have been wrong about that cover artist, whatever that means." Standing on tiptoes, he glanced over Dean's shoulder at the two bodies on the ground. "They going to be alright, do you think?"

Really hating that a _demon_ had to remind him of his brother's condition, Dean ran over to Sam, who was still coughing up a gruesome mixture of mud and blood. "Sam, you okay?"

Sam coughed again. "Does it look like it?" he asked, voice impossibly hoarse. "I guess we know why there were no witnesses now," he added.

Dean laughed shortly. "Guess so," he agreed. Raising his voice, he asked, "Crowley, how's Cas?"

"Oh, he's _fine_. Just _peachy_, in fact," Crowley squawked.

Dean looked up.

Castiel wasn't exactly fine – he had mud dripping out of his mouth and ears, that wasn't what Dean would call "fine" – but he was apparently well enough that he could get Crowley in a choking grip.

"Cas," Dean said. "He helped us. Put him down."

After a long moment, Castiel relented, dropping Crowley on his ass. He glared up at the angel, muttering unkind words, and stood up, brushing off his pants. He flicked Castiel on the forehead, barked, "You're welcome!" and walked towards Dean, frowning.

Castiel coughed once, twice, and spat out a large amount of mud. He blinked, and shook his head, mud spraying out of unfortunate places. When he stopped, his entire head was mud-free and showed no signs that he'd even been attacked. "Thank you," he said reluctantly.

Crowley, standing over Sam, rolled his eyes. "Bastard." He flicked Sam on the forehead as well, which led to a coughing fit that eventually ended in Sam looking and feeling okay. He stood up, Dean supporting him on one side, hardly believing it.

"Can't believe I'm saying this," Sam said, "but thanks, Crowley."

Crowley rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah. If you want answers, I've left my card in your pockets." With that, he disappeared.

Sam reached into his pocket, and pulled out a blank business card. One side had an international telephone number on it. A bewildered look on his face, Castiel reached into his pockets as well, eventually coming across one that had a similar card in it, though for a different number.

There was a card in Dean's pocket too, but no phone. Which – oh shit, Dean remembered where he'd left that, an apartment that was probably covered in mud –

"Almost forgot!" Crowley said from just behind Dean. He winced, but didn't jump. "Here," he said, tossing Dean his phone. Between carrying half of Sam's massive body weight and holding onto Crowley's card, it was a difficult and complicated fumbling process that got Dean's phone back in his pocket.

"Thanks."

"And there," Crowley added, pointing at a familiar black car, not too far off. "Don't worry, no charge for the dry cleaning."

"Thanks," Dean repeated, much more sincerely this time.

Crowley rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Just don't let yourselves go getting killed again any time soon. I can't keep living on Earth if you don't save it."

Dean smirked. "Whatever, man, I've read the book. I've got your number."

Crowley looked away. "I don't know _what_ you're talking about." And he was gone.

Dean's phone rang. Grumbling, he got it back out of his pocket again as he lugged Sam towards the Impala. At some point, Castiel had decided to call the number on his business card, and from his tone was definitely _not_ speaking to Crowley.

"Izrafel, I don't understand – just tell me what's really going on–"

Dean answered his phone. "Hello?"

"Oh, hey Dean!"

"Becky." Sam turned a look on Dean, but he just shoved his brother into the passenger seat of the Impala and mouthed "tell you later". "What's up, you got another creature to save me from?"

She giggled. "No, just checking on you guys. Chuck said you'd taken care of the golem by now."

"Yeah," Dean agreed, revving the engine. Castiel popped into the backseat, still talking on his cell. "Just finished."

"How'd it go?"

"Didn't you read that part already?"

"Well, yeah, but it'd be cool hearing your side of the story!"

Dean rolled his eyes. "Maybe later, Becky, we're still kind of in the "monster clean-up" part of the hunt."

Sam's phone rang. He looked at Dean, who shrugged. He shrugged, and answered.

"Hello?"

"Oh, sorry," Becky said. "I'll call later."

"You do that." Dean hung up.

"–but how can you _trust_ him?" Castiel asked, still on his call with Aziraphale, still really confused. "I don't–"

"Adam?" Sam said. "Like, _the_ Adam?" Then: "Uh. Wow. Is it weird that you're one of my favorite fictional antichrists?" After a pause, he laughed. "Yeah, I guess so. Did, uh, did Crowley ask you to talk to me?"

"What do you mean by an "Arrangement"?" Castiel asked carefully.

Laughing to himself, Dean drove them out of the field and in search of a proper highway.

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the end of "Amorphous"! Thanks for actually reading it through the entire piece, as odd as it got at times. This was my first big bang, as well as the first fic over 10,000 words I've completed in several years. As such, I'm not entirely satisfied with the finished work, but it did what I wanted to do.
> 
> I wanted to write a Supernatural/Good Omens crossover (which, at the time of big bang sign-ups, weren't nearly as common as they are now). I wanted to write a longer fic with a plot (which is not exactly my strong suit). And I wanted to write a Supernatural fic involving a Judaic "creature" (which I'd seen weren't really used in the show).
> 
> Once again, I want to thank my artist [angelicfoodcake](http://angelicfoodcake.livejournal.com/profile) for all the pieces she made, and the mods at [sncross_bigbang](http://community.livejournal.com/sncross_bigbang/profile) for making this fic a possibility in the first place. I really enjoyed the big bang experience, and I'm likely to sign up for another after this promising first experience.
> 
> A few other comments:
> 
> Generally speaking, it's a good idea to know what you're writing before you get into a big bang. Normally that wouldn't be a problem for me, but I spent the first month waffling between this plot and a more Apocalypse-focused plot. Which is not an idea I would recommend to anyone else going for a big bang - I really had to rush my first draft.
> 
> The doll Dean spots in Becky's apartment that he describes as "some chick with ridiculously red hair and freaky looking eyes" is actually one of [this](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41XUu3Cv1dL._SS500_.jpg) YuYu Hakusho character. I don't know why, I just think he's Becky's type.
> 
> The events of "The Devil You Know" and "Two Minutes to Midnight" were both a blessing and a curse to this fic. On one hand, more Crowley! More Crowley characterization to work with, more tidbits of his life to add in (see: the coin nicked from the Impala). But also the Winchesters reacting way differently to Crowley's return than I'd expected. Rather than change around the entire characterization of the fic (difficult to do this late in the game), and/or place it chronologically after those two episodes (where it could _almost_-but-not-quite fit), I've decided this fic exists in a slight AU of the current season, not long after "My Bloody Valentine".


End file.
